I Want You To Be My Last
by lovethatignites
Summary: "You let him kiss you because you know what, Emma? You're in love with him. And it doesn't matter what I do, you are always going to be in love with him. I could give you the fucking moon and all the planets in the solar system and it still wouldn't be enough because I'd still be me!" Oh, how wrong he was.


"He [was] your first love. I intend to be your last. However long it takes."

-Klaus Mikaelson, _The Vampire Diaries_ , episode 423 Graduation

* * *

Emma Alonso's jitteriness was at an all-time high Friday morning. It was Day 5 of the Continuum Break, the last day for Daniel Miller to remember his old life before he and his family disappeared forever. Emma had spent practically every waking moment with Daniel all week, desperately trying to jog his memory: showing him the trophy case where he used to hold numerous medals, tele-transporting him to the pool where he first learned about her powers, going to the boat dock that used to be 'their place'… Nothing had worked in the slightest.

Emma ran across the street without looking both ways, earning her a blaring honk from a fellow citizen of Miami. She didn't care; she didn't have time. Or more specifically, _Daniel_ didn't have time. According to her phone, there were only two minutes remaining until her ex-boyfriend vanished for good.

The Chosen One rushed through the Sanchezes'/Millers' yard and went in the garage side door. Thanks to an obedience spell, Mr. and Mrs. Sanchez had agreed to let the "foreign exchange student" stay at their house for the week, under the condition he dress properly at all times. This meant when he wasn't wearing his school uniform, Daniel still had to dress up, usually in a dress shirt and some nicely colored pants. Still, there was no way she was going to waste a single second trying to get past the old people at the front door. They still didn't like her.

When Emma arrived in what used to be Daniel's colorful garage but was now a professional office-type room, she was mortified to see he wasn't there. He always waited here for her in the mornings; she walked with him to school. Unfortunately none of their morning strolls had conjured up any memories in the boy's head either.

"DANIEL!" Emma screamed at the top of her lungs, feeling as though she was about to have a panic attack. She still had a minute and ten seconds left. He couldn't be gone yet!

Just then, the boy in question appeared in the doorway between the used-to-be garage and the hallway… in a dress shirt and bright blue pants.

"What are you wearing?!" Emma asked, feeling her hands start to shake. "School's about to start!"

"I'm not going to school," he said simply. "I'm going to… be gone."

Emma was going to cry. "No! H-Here," she fumbled with her phone, a wave of tears working its way through her. "Listen to this song. It's the song you sang freshman year at the Anime Dance, the f-first time we kissed, and—"

"Emma." Daniel reached out and took her phone. She was too shocked to grab it back. "You don't have to do this."

"But there's still a minute left!" she sputtered. "We can't give up!"

"Calm down," he said in a voice devoid of any worry whatsoever. "It's over." He walked past her toward the storage closet on the other side of the room.

Emma felt like everything inside of her was exploding and everything outside of her was collapsing. She dropped her bag on the floor and followed him. "Danny, no, you can't die!" Upon saying the actual word, the tears spilled over and streamed down her face. "This is my fault! I never meant to hurt you, p-please just listen to the song—"

"Emma." Daniel set her phone on a shelf inside the closet and turned to her. "I know you didn't do this on purpose, and I'm not mad at you. But what's done is done."

"No," she whimpered, choking back a sob.

"I remember living a wonderful life with my family, nursing injured animals back to health."

"No!" she said again, louder this time. They had to be down to thirty seconds.

"I'm at peace with…" He waved his hands around. "This."

"But that wasn't even your life!" she shouted, hysterical by this point. "Your life was here in Miami! Your life was intertwined with mine for the past two years! You were my first love; I cared about you more than anything in the world!"

Daniel's face tinged with pain for this girl and before he knew what he was doing, he closed the space between them, leaned down, and kissed her. And the moment he closed his eyes, a flash of images played through his mind: _playing with dump trucks with Andi in kindergarten, dating Maddie, sneezing in the school's main office moments before meeting Emma, throwing grapes to Emma at lunch, learning about magic, helping defeat the evil ex-Principal, kissing Emma at the Anime Dance…_

Quickly, Daniel brought his hand to her waist, trying to _see_ more, and quicker.

It worked.

Suddenly, everything was rushing at him at lightning speed: _Mac and Tony leaving Iridium High, Jax spraying dirt on him the first day of sophomore year, the all-nighter with Jax and Diego that ended at Maddie's house, breaking up with Emma over the clones, getting back together with her, lifeguarding over the summer, fighting with Jax, Mia and the spider seal, breaking up with Emma again, Phillip, the video game…_

Daniel pulled away from the shocked girl, feeling like he was about to pass out from information overload. From his peripheral vision, he noticed the garage had changed back to it's cluttered, homey self. But all he was concerned with was Emma's choice. Looking somewhere behind her, he asked, "Did she choose yet?"

"What are you…" Emma turned around and followed his gaze.

Jax was standing in the doorway.

And to say he looked heartbroken would be the understatement of the year.

Emma's heart fell into her stomach and her mouth dropped open but she couldn't make any words come out.

She didn't need to; Jax tele-transported away in the blink of an eye.

The T3 appeared in his place.

"Daniel, get outta the way, we need to find the SlimeMaster 2000 for school!" Robbie yelled, leading the others past their eldest brother.

"Kids, get in the car, now!" their mother shouted from somewhere down the hall.

Emma was so overcome with emotions she could do nothing but stand stock still. At the same time she wanted to jump for joy and hug Daniel, she wanted to race out of the house and explain her ass off to Jax. Yet here she was, doing neither. Frozen.

Daniel held his head in his hands and winced. "This is so weird. It's like… It's like it's all coming back to me, but I can still remember my alternate life, too…" He paused for a moment then looked down at Emma, a look of dejection on his face. "You chose Jax."

"I did." Emma was just glad she finally managed to get a couple words out.

"KIDS!" Christine hollered once more.

"Go, go, go!" Mel pushed her brothers toward the door and the kids were gone.

The hurt cleared from Daniel's face and was replaced with realization. "You chose Jax and I just kissed you in front of him."

Emma wanted to break down in tears all over again. This was so, so bad. Her hands were starting to shake again, but for an entirely different reason than before.

Apparently Daniel could tell because he stepped closer and said, "Hey," outreaching an arm.

Emma immediately stepped away. "Please don't," she whispered, tears filling her eyes once more.

Daniel quickly retracted his arm and said gently, "I kissed you. Not the other way around."

"I didn't stop you…"

The human didn't know what to do, so he just stood there.

Emma sniffled and wiped the back of her hand across her nose. She knelt down and grabbed her bag off the floor. "Look, Daniel, I'm really happy you're okay, but I have to go—"

"I get it." He hurried over to the closet, extracted Emma's phone, and handed it back to her. "Go talk to Jax. It'll be okay."

She couldn't have stopped this second round of tears if she tried. She shook her head and whimpered, "I don't think it will be."

"Emma?" Daniel looked at her with nothing but sincerity and said quietly, "He loves you. It'll be okay."

There was nothing she could say to that without her tears turning into sobs, so she dashed out of the Millers' house as quickly as she could.

Jax lived a couple blocks away from Daniel, but Emma was moving as fast as she possibly could, cutting the time down by at least half. She called Jax a dozen times on the way but he was ignoring her calls as expected, which only made her stomach churn and her legs move faster.

When she reached the Novoa mansion, only one vehicle was gone: whichever car Mr. Novoa had taken to work that day. Jax's motorcycle and the magic convertible were still in the driveway, which meant he was home.

Emma walked up the porch steps on shaking legs and rang the doorbell.

"Jax, please open up," she yelled. "I know you don't want to talk to me right now, but I'd really like to explain!"

Silence.

Emma rang the doorbell once again and waited a full minute.

Nothing.

"Jax, please!"

She pulled on the fancy door handles, but they didn't budge.

"Please," she tried to say again, but her voice broke off after the first three letters. She leaned against the door and held her breath, trying her best to keep it together.

One more ring.

One more silence.

Emma pushed herself away from the door and descended the porch steps, hanging her head in shame. She'd only taken three steps onto the sidewalk when it occurred to her she didn't need his permission to go inside. She turned around, took a deep breath, and shot a spell at the front doors.

They opened in an instant.

Somehow this made her even more nervous, but she didn't care. The witch gathered all her courage, hoisted her bag over her shoulder, and marched inside.

"Jax?" she called, cautiously walking toward the center of the front foyer. "Jax, can we please—"

"What did you do?!"

Emma jumped at the unexpected voice, turning to find where it had come from. A little girl with dark hair and red glasses was running down the fancy staircase, her eyes bloodshot, her cheeks flushed.

"Wh-Who are you?"

"I'm Jax's sister!"

The witch's eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "Sister? Since when does Jax have a sister?"

The little girl reached the bottom of the staircase. "I've been here since last week. You might know that if you ever paid any attention to him!"

Emma's heart sank further. She swallowed the lump of guilt materializing in her throat.

The little girl walked toward her, clearly both angry and devastated. "What did you do to him?" she squeaked, tears running down her face.

Emma made a mad dash for the stairs.

"NO! He doesn't want to see you!"

But the teenage witch was faster than the most-likely-eight-year-old child and was out of her reach in no time. The steps and the walls and the railing turned into a blur of color as she hurried past them, desperate to reach the second story. "Jax!" she called out.

"GO AWAY!" The little girl's voice was getting closer.

"Jax, please!" There were so many rooms in this house and Emma had no idea which one belonged to her boyfriend… _or ex-boyfriend_. Nonono, she was not going there.

"I said he doesn't want to see you!" The child appeared behind her and grabbed her arm, trying to yank her toward the stairs.

"Let go of me!"

"Get out of our house!"

Suddenly one of the doors flew open. Jax appeared in the doorway, making a special effort to avoid Emma's eyes with his own bloodshot ones. "Jess, let go." He sounded… tired. That wasn't the right word but that was the worst word Emma was willing to admit he sounded.

"But—"

"Let. Go."

Jessie released the witch's arm and ran to her brother, hugging him tight.

He knelt down and hugged her back, once again looking anywhere but at Emma. "Why don't you go downstairs and do some more baking, okay?"

"But—"

"It's okay."

Jessie frowned, gave her big brother a kiss on the cheek, and ran downstairs…

…leaving Emma and Jax alone in the hallway.

Emma cleared her throat and asked, "May I come in?" She was so timid, she reminded herself of a mouse.

Jax's expression remained blank. For a moment he just stood still, staring at the floor. Finally he offered what could be best described as a shrug and slipped back into his room. It was so unlike him. He always had a definite answer, was always so sure of himself, always communicated with her through eye contact…

Emma shook her head as hard as she could. No way. Those thoughts and memories and images could not inhabit her brain right now or she would lose it all over again. The moment she got her legs to communicate, she walked down the hall and stepped into Jax's room. It was red and black with his many sports awards displayed on a shelf. Next to his bed was a picture frame facing down. Emma could guess who that was of.

"I like your room," she blurted. It was totally inappropriate but it was out of her mouth before she could stop it.

Jax stood on the opposite side of the room, staring blankly at the wall across from him. If he heard her comment, he showed no sign of it.

The… lack of interest in anything… in Jax's eyes was causing Emma's internal self-hatred to brew more and more, and if she didn't start talking now, she was afraid it would overflow and choke her to death.

"I'm not really sure where to start," she finally said. That single sentence stole all the air out of her lungs, took everything in her to produce, so much that she had no idea how she was going to say what actually needed to be said. "I know what you think you saw—"

"Don't."

One word. It was only one word but it was the harshest word Emma had ever heard in her life.

And yet, now that she'd started talking, she couldn't stop.

"But he kissed me—"

"Who cares, Emma?" Jax finally met her eyes, and what she saw in them immediately made her wish he hadn't. "Who cares if he kissed you? He's all you've thought about for the past week. You spent every waking moment of every day with him. I think anyone could've seen what was coming."

"But, Jax." She stepped closer. "I didn't want to kiss him—"

"BUT YOU DID!"

Emma froze where she was, genuinely afraid of her boyfriend for the first time in her life. Because never before had she seen him so destroyed.

"You let him kiss you because you know what, Emma? You're in love with him. And it doesn't matter what I do, you are always going to be in love with him. I could give you the fucking moon and all the planets in the solar system and it still wouldn't be enough because I'd still be me!"

"That's not true—"

"Oh yes it is, Emma! Don't _lie_. I'm never enough. Nothing I do is ever enough for you. It doesn't matter that I love you more than anything in this world, it doesn't matter that I would literally die to protect you, I'm still Jax Worthless Novoa and that will never be good enough for you."

The worst part of this entire situation was that Emma could tell Jax truly believed everything he was saying. She knew his dad routinely told him he was a failure, and now here he was, genuinely believing the girl he loved felt the same way. And it was for that reason she started crying for the third time in the past hour.

Jax walked over to his bed and sat on the edge, facing away from her. "You should go."

"Jax, please just let me—"

"GO, Emma."

Emma squeezed her eyes shut, tears stinging her eyes and pouring down her face in sheets of rain. Her throat clenched in pain, making it a struggle to swallow. He told her to leave. He was going to be angry if she didn't.

But no part of her wanted to leave, and if she was right, deep down, he didn't want her to leave, either.

Tentatively, she placed one foot in front of the other again and again until she reached the bed. She walked around the front and sat on the edge next to him. He didn't move a muscle, as though he was unaware of her presence.

"Do you remember," she began slowly, "last year at the vortex after the eclipse passed? You walked up to me to apologize, and I heard you out?"

No response.

Emma gently placed her hand on top of his and said, "I need you to reverse the roles for me right now. I need you to hear me out."

It wasn't lost on the witch he was very close to crying himself. But he didn't make any sort of objection which she took as her in.

"I wasn't lying when I said I would've tried to save _anyone_ if they were in the position I accidentally put Daniel in. But I didn't tell you the complete truth, either. I was… particularly motivated… to save Daniel because… I loved him once." She said the next part in a rush before she got a negative response and lost her nerve. "I met him months before I met you, and I fell in love with him, fast. I can't change that and I don't want to.

"I know there were so many times I was unkind to you." Her voice wavered. She bit her tongue until she tasted blood and trusted herself to speak again. "But what you didn't know... what I didn't want to admit to myself... was that, when I said and did some of the things I said and did, I was terrified because I could feel myself starting to fall for you. And I thought…" She shook her head. "I thought that was wrong because I had this idea that I was supposed to be with Daniel forever, that he was the love of my life."

The witch placed her other hand on top of the wizard's now, too. "But what I started to realize these past couple of weeks—before the continuum breaks, I mean—is that Daniel was my _first_ love, not my only love. I'm not in love with him anymore, and that's not a bad thing. It's not wrong for me to move on."

She tried to take a couple of deep breaths to steady herself, but nothing about them qualified as deep… or breaths, really. "Daniel and I had some great times together, but I was never comfortable talking to him about my powers. He tried, but he could never truly accept who I was. He wanted me to be… normal. Like him.

"But you… you don't want me to be anything but me. You accept me for who I am and you understand me and you help me to grow and you encourage me to experience life and… I know it hurts you to know you can't be my first love, but I'm glad you're not. I don't want you to be my first love; I…" She squeezed his hand tighter and said through her tears, "I want you to be my last. I love you, Jax, and I'm so sorry I made you feel like what your dad said was true, but I swear it's not, and I—"

"Wait." He turned to her for the first time since they sat down, looking at her with wonder. "What did you just say?"

"I said I love you."

The words were barely off her tongue when his mouth landed on hers. Their kiss was honest and real and beautiful, a language all its own. Jax wrapped his arms around her waist; Emma wrapped her arms around his neck. For the first time all morning, she finally felt like she could breathe again. Funny, considering she was actually losing oxygen.

When they finally moved apart, Emma murmured, "It didn't feel like that."

"What?"

"When Daniel kissed me," she explained, a smile slowly forming on her lips. "It didn't feel like that. It didn't feel good like it used to; it just felt… wrong." The witch took the wizard's hands in hers and said, "But that… that felt _right_." She bit her lip then and added, "And trust me when I say you're more than enough. Because I promise you are."

Jax cupped Emma's face in his hands and used his thumbs to wipe away her tears. " _I love you_ , Emma Alonso."

She smiled, leaned toward her boyfriend, and gave him another kiss. Before this one could get passionate, though, an explosion went off downstairs. She jumped and asked, "What was that?!"

Jax groaned. "That would be Jessie, setting off flour bombs. Again." He stood and held out a hand to his girlfriend. "We should probably go check that out."

The witch took his hand and followed him out the door. "So she likes baking?"

"Loves it. She's actually pretty good at making cake… when she doesn't eat half the batter first."

Emma giggled. She found that an inner peace was settling inside of her. Hopefully over time Jessie would warm up to her, and when she did, they could bake and scrapbook together. Once she was older, they could go shopping together, too. She admired the look of determination on Jax's face as he led them through the hallway and smiled to herself. If she got her heart's desire, they'd have all the bonding time in the world.


End file.
